OHL Alumni Central

The KHL regular season has come to a close in Russia for 2010-11 and Traktor Chelyabinsk finds themselves in ninth place in the Eastern Conference, 11 points out of a playoff spot. Chelyabinsk is the current club of Ontario Hockey League grad, Vitaly Yachmenev.

Yachmenev played two seasons in the Ontario Hockey League, 1993-94 and 1994-95 and took the league by storm. In his first season, he led the league with 61 goals and was named not only the OHL’s rookie of the year but the CHL’s rookie of the year as well. He helped the North Bay Centennials to a Hamilton Spectator Trophy as regular season champs and a Robertson Cup as the OHL’s playoff champions. Vitaly added 32 points in 18 playoff games for the Centennials. The team’s luck ran out at the Memorial Cup, going 0-3.

The following season, Yachmenev scored 53 for the Centennials while adding 52 assists for 105 points in 59 games. The 105 points was good enough for ninth in the OHL. He helped Russia to a Silver Medal at the IIHF Under-20 World Hockey Championships. Vitaly was also awarded the William Hanley Trophy as the Ontario Hockey League’s Most Sportsmanlike Player. The award is representative of the way Yachmenev has played the game throughout his career. His highest penalty minute total came in 2005-06 with just 30 in Russia’s Super League.

After his first season with North Bay, Yachmenev was drafted surprisingly low, going in the third round of the 1994 NHL Entry Draft, 59th overall to the Los Angeles Kings. Vitaly put in  almost 500 games in the NHL with Los Angeles and the Nashville Predators before skipping to Russia for the start of the 2003-04 season. Unfortunately, the goal scoring ability that he showed with the Centennials never really resurfaced and he topped out with a season of 19 goals with the Kings.

In his eighth season in Russia, Yachmenev scored just four goals and added 12 assists in 43 games for Chelyabinsk. His current contract expired at the end of this season.

Vitaly spent the year playing with another Ontario Hockey League grad, Alexander Buturlin, on Traktor Chelyabinsk.

Check out Vitaly Yachmenev’s profile page at the KHL official website.

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Chris Eade as a member of EC Bad Nauheim in Germany.

Former Ontario Hockey League defenseman Chris Eade was a last minute pickup by the Rapid City Rush at the Central Hockey League’s transaction deadline. Rapid City is in a dogfight with the Colorado Eagles for first place in the Turner Conference of the CHL. Eade should help to bolster the blue line.

Chris Eade played five seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1998-99 to 2002-03. He began his OHL career with the North Bay Centennials and played with the club until five games into the 2001-02 season when he was shipped to the Erie Otters. His destiny was to end up in the United States as staying with North Bay would have meant his final season in the OHL would have been played in Saginaw.

In the 2001-02 season, Eade contributed 40 points in 59 games from the blue line for the Otters. He contributed another 12 in 21 playoff games as Erie knocked off the Barrie Colts in the Robertson Cup finals to become playoff champions of the Ontario Hockey League.

Chris Eade was taken in the fourth round of the 2000 NHL Entry Draft by the Florida Panthers, 115th overall. Instead of turning pro right away, Eade took the Canadian university route and played four seasons with the Western Mustangs from 2003-04 to 2006-07.

Eade played one full season with the Dayton Bombers of the ECHL in 2007-08 before heading to Europe and Germany’s Oberliga. Chris played two seasons, 2008-09 and 2009-10 with EC Bad Nauheim, sharing time with Ontario Hockey League and Western Mustang grads, Ryan Hare and Kyle Piwowarczyk. In his first season with Bad Nauheim, Eade was fifth on the team in points (52) and second in assists (47) in 54 games. He led the team’s defensemen in scoring.

Chris started out the 2010-11 season in Hungary with Ferencváros and had 21 points in 25 games with the team before heading back to North America and the Rapid City Rush.

Check out Chris Eade’s profile page at the Rapid City Rush official website.

Chris Eade also appears in a previous post at OHL Alumni Central featuring OHL grads playing for EC Bad Nauheim.

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Ontario Hockey League grad Colin Beardsmore is now well into his eleventh season in Germany’s Deutsche Eishockey Liga (DEL). Beardsmore is in his first season back with Nürnberg Ice Tigers after a three year stint from 2005-06 to 2007-08. Colin has also played for the Iserlohn Roosters, Augsburger Panthers, Kölner Haie, Kassel Huskies and Adler Mannheim.

Beardsmore played three seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1995-96 to 1997-98. He started his first year with the Detroit Junior Whalers and moved to the North Bay Centennials at the trade deadline. The following season began with the Centennials and saw him move over to the Owen Sound Platers after 40 games. The timing of the trade allowed Colin to play 70 games in 1996-97 when the league only played a 66 game schedule. Beardsmore remained in Owen Sound for his final season in the Ontario Hockey League.

Taken by the Detroit Red Wings in the seventh round of the 1996 NHL Entry Draft, 189th overall, Colin never saw an NHL game. Such was life as a late draft pick of the powerful and deep Detroit Red Wings of the mid to late 1990′s. He spent his first season in professional hockey with Detroit’s ECHL affiliate Toledo Storm with 17 games of call-up time with the AHL’s Adirondack Red Wings.

After a year in the Canadian university system with University of New Brunswick in 1999-00, it was off to Germany for the 2000-01 season. Colin will come close to cracking the 600 career DEL game plateau this season.

Check out Colin Beardsmore’s profile page on the Nürnberg Ice Tigers official website.

Joining Colin on the Ice Tigers this season are the following Ontario Hockey League alumni:

Rob Leask

Jan Platil

Patrick Ehelechner

Corey Neilson played four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1993-94 to 1996-97. He began his career with the North Bay Centennials then moved to the Detroit Junior Whalers midway through the 1995-96 season. In his final season in the OHL, Neilson played for the Barrie Colts.

In his first season with North Bay, the team won the Hamilton Spectator as the Ontario Hockey League’s regular season champion and went on to defeat Detroit to win the Robertson Cup as the league’s playoff champion. Corey was selected to the OHL’s First All-Rookie Team.

After his first season, Neilson was drafted by the Edmonton Oilers in the third round of the 1994 NHL Entry Draft, 53rd overall. For the most part, from 1999-00 to 2005-06, Corey spent his time in the ECHL with exception of the 2002-03 season which he played in the UHL and AHL. Neilson was twice and ECHL All-Star and was Defenseman of the year in 2003-04.

Since 2006-07, Corey has been a member of the Nottingham Panthers in Great Britain’s Elite Ice Hockey League. Neilson has led the league’s defensemen twice in scoring and currently leads the EIHL’s defensemen this season with 45 points in 42 games. The team is sitting in fourth place in the league with the possibility of going up a position and realistically no chance of going down. Corey has achieved his personal numbers and has led the team as head coach for the past three seasons.

His influence as head coach has brought in some very talented Ontario Hockey League grads for the stretch run, such as Daniel Tkaczuk and Jeff Heerema (click on names to view previous posts featuring those players).

Check out Corey Neilson’s profile page at the Nottingham Panthers official website.

Greg Labenski with the ECHL's Dayton Bombers.

The team names have changed and he’s covered three different leagues but North Bay Centennials grad Greg Labenski is spending his fifth season in Dayton, Ohio. This season, it’s as captain of the Central Hockey League’s Dayton Gems. He captained the same team in 2009-10 but they were a member of the now defunct International Hockey League. The three seasons previous to that, Labenski was a member of the East Coast Hockey League’s Dayton Bombers.

Greg Labenski played four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1995-96 to 1998-99, all with the North Bay Centennials. Greg went undrafted but has made a decent career for himself, entering his 11th season in pro hockey, mostly played in the ECHL and UHL/IHL/CHL.

Typically, the careers of minor league players read like a geography lesson. Not Greg Labenski’s. With exception to 1999-00 when he played for Team Canada and 2001-02 when he split his season between the ECHL’s Louisiana IceGators and the AHL’s Houston Aeros, Greg has spent his entire career in the states of Ohio and Michigan. His other Ohio teams include the Toledo Storm of the ECHL, the Cincinnati Cyclones of the ECHL and the Cleveland Barons of the AHL. In Michigan, he played parts of three seasons with the UHL’s Kalamazoo Wings. In 2005-06, he won a UHL championship with the Wings and was selected to the UHL all-star team.

In 2006-07, he almost hoisted a cup again. Playing for the Dayton Bombers, Labenski helped the team march to the Kelly Cup finals before bowing out to Idaho in five games.

Check out Greg Labenski’s profile page on the Dayton Gems official website.

For some reason, Greg was left out of this previous post on grads of the North Bay Centennials active in pro hockey during the 2009-10 season.

Greg Labenski is on the OHL Alumni Big List.